Diini be feart Flyman for I have Granny Giles’s hat peen tae set ye free.

With yin mighty poke I shall burst yer evil bubble.

Translate:

peen: pin.

Do not be frightened Flyman for I have Granny Giles’s hat pin to set you free.

With one mighty poke I shall burst your evil bubble.

pin
The Scottish Word: peen with its definition and its meaning illustrated and captioned with the word used in context in the Scots language and in English.

Hat Pin.

The most famous hat held with a pin right away for me was the one belonging to Granny Giles.

From the long running series of large format political cartoons by the Daily Express cartoonist Giles. A granny instantly recogniseable to anyone of my generation and older.

As a small child I studied Giles’s artwork along with those of my other British greats Bud Neil, Wally Fawkes and Sydney Jordan.

And I did study them. I remember at the time (60s) wondering how Sydney Jordan so neatly and regularly made all those little dots to make areas of grey. Not realising that it was part of the print process.

And only later discovered that you could buy different density dot transfers which you could rub onto the artwork. I had a lot to learn. Still have.

You can view a selection of Giles’s work on the British Cartoon Archive University of Kent.